Traditional chinese medicine: a treasured natural resource of anticancer drug research and development.

Traditional chinese medicine: a treasured natural resource of anticancer drug research and development. Am J Chin Med. 2014;42(3):543-59 Authors: Wang CY, Bai XY, Wang CH Abstract To discover and develop novel natural compounds, active ingredients, single herbs and combination formulas or prescriptions in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) with therapeutic selectivity that can preferentially kill cancer cells and inhibit the amplification of cancer without significant toxicity is an important area in cancer therapy. A lot of valuable TCMs were applied as alternative or complementary medicines in the United States and Europe. But these TCMs, as one of the main natural resources, were widely used to research and develop new drugs in Asia. In TCMs, some specific herbs, animals, minerals and combination formulas were recorded and exploited due to their active ingredients and specific natural compounds with antitumor activities. The article focused on the antitumor properties of natural compounds and combination formulas or prescriptions in TCMs, described its influence on tumor progression, angiogenesis, metastasis, and revealed its mechanisms of antitumor and inhibitory action. Among the nature compounds, triptolide, berberine, matrine, oxymatrine, kurarinone and deoxypodophyllotoxin (DPT) with specific molecular structures have been separated, purified, and evaluated their antitumor properties in vitro and in vivo. Cancer is a multifac...
Source: The American Journal of Chinese Medicine - Category: Complementary Medicine Authors: Tags: Am J Chin Med Source Type: research